BeauBo: If we see B-52’s moving into a forward position, the it will mean we will start destroying ISIS’s outer defense walls around Mosul. But again, Obama is such a coward that he would be yelling “collateral damage” and call the attacks off.
I hate commies in the White House.
We (Iraqis, Kurds and Iranians) won’t need B-52’s to get into Mosul.
ISIS is trying to dig trenches around the city (A famous tactic used by Muhammed to defend Medina), but such trenches would be a typical obstacle for Combat Engineers, with their armored bulldozers, rather than B-52’s. They will get some trenches and fighting positions developed by Summer, but we will be watching what they build. They don’t have the capability to build any kind of showstopper great wall - just hinderances that could marginally slow things or increase casualties.
No Government wants to level its own cities, and neither do the Iraqis. ISIS is a small minority in the city, even if the majority Sunni population was initially glad to see them (after a few years of Shia rule giving them the shaft). ISIS has less support from the population now, and most will likely be non-combatants.
Unless ISIS can muster a major mobilization of new fighters, it will be more like a big cordon and search operation - only blowing things up when they are firing from there, or intel pinpoints them. The main effort will be urban warfare and countering guerrillas and terrorists after occupying the city.
We’ll see how things shape up as the buildup develops - will the population rally to support ISIS, or jam the phones calling in their positions? Will ISIS reinforce or withdraw? No doubt they will deploy a bunch of suicide bombers in any case, but to really hold a big city will require sustained mid to high intensity combat. Supplying that much ammo and taking hundreds of casualties a day will test them as never before.
A lot will depend on how things are going elsewhere. If ISIS is getting coordinated major attacks on several fronts, it might abandon Mosul. If that is their only big threat at that time though, they could focus a big effort in Mosul.
And there is the possibility that the whole thing could settle into a protracted Sectarian Sunni/Shia human rights violation contest.
However it goes, I am still calling it the “Summer of Death”.